We begin Holy Week by remembering Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem. I say triumphal but actually it wasn’t very triumphal at all. It was much more like a raggedy procession of hobbledehoys greeted by the poor and downtrodden.

But for all its hopelessness it was indeed a procession and it certainly marked the formal entry into Jerusalem of Christ, the long awaited Messiah.

The key concept we need to employ here is the one of paradox. If you want to understand anything about Jesus then you have to understand paradox. Everything is the opposite to what it seems and everything that he does appears to the outside world to be a contradiction.

If Christ is the Messiah, the long heralded King of Israel, the King of all Kings, then his entry into Jerusalem should have been accompanied by all the signs and trappings of earthly kingship. There should have been a splendid welcome laid on by the priests and the whole populace should have been out to meet him with the great and the good at the very front.

But what we actually what we have is a few raggle-taggle poor people waving palms and singing Hosanna. So inconsistent and unreliable a bunch were they that we have no trouble assuming that some of them might even have turned up in the crowd who shouted “Crucify him, crucify him” later that same week.

But this is all of a piece with everything we know about Jesus. He shuns the limelight, he avoids publicity, he is one who is completely uninterested in outward appearances and is only concerned with things of the heart. He is indeed the ultimate paradox.

Here is a King who wants to rule by means of love alone; a King who wants not to dominate but to serve; a King whose greatest interest is in humility and lowliness rather than honour and power. Here is a King who gives his life for his people.

We begin today a very serious week of prayer and increased devotion as we shift our focus more closely on to the suffering and death of Christ. It is a week during which we accompany Christ in his last hours and draw close to him in his suffering and death. It is a week during which we face up to our own sinfulness and express deep sorrow for our transgressions. It is a week of increased faith and trust in God.

I urge each and every one of you to take this week seriously. Yes we all have to go to work and do whatever it is we do during every other week of the year but it is vital that we make this week different. It is essential that we make this a more spiritual week, a week of renewed prayer, a week of deep devotion.

The Church observes this Holy Week in its liturgy but also at certain times by its lack of liturgy. We celebrate mass on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday as usual but we do so thinking most especially about those days in Jerusalem and what they have come to mean.

However, on Maundy Thursday we celebrate no mass except the solemn liturgy of the Lord’s Supper in the evening after which the altar is stripped and the Blessed Sacrament removed to the Altar of Repose.

Then on Good Friday again no mass is celebrated but instead we have the very moving Liturgy of the Passion at three o’clock during which we commemorate Christ’s death on the Cross in a most solemn way.

Again on Holy Saturday there is one single liturgy of the Easter Vigil when we light the Easter Fire and celebrate as well as we can the Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ.

It is important to attend these ceremonies, it is essential to mark these important events which are so vital for the life of the world.

Everyone else in the world takes advantage of a couple of days off work to give themselves some leisure time and we should do the same. But we must not neglect the liturgy; we must not neglect our Christian duty to commemorate in a liturgical way these crucial incidents in the life of Christ.

Today we begin by singing Hosanna and waving our Palms. We remember the scruffy procession that entered Jerusalem, that brought the King of Creation into the Holy City on the back of a humble donkey. We rejoice and we acknowledge that we are citizens of heaven, true members of his Kingdom of Love.

Where had they gone, all those people who greeted the Lord with such exuberance during his triumphal entrance into Jerusalem? Where had they gone, now that He has left the city in a completely different type of triumph, the Triumph of the Cross? There were only a handful of people at the foot of the cross. The people who were there were the people who loved Him more than their own lives. The people who were there were people of faith, faith that God the Father would prevail even as Goodness was crucified. How horrible the other disciples of the Lord must have felt when they realized that they did not have enough faith to stand beneath the cross with Mary, John and those few others.…more

Palm Sunday, Year C—March 20, 2016

“Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord, the King of Israel. Hosanna in the highest!” (Mt 21:9)Gospel (Read Lk 22:14-23:56)On Palm Sunday, Catholics all over the globe, in every nation and time zone, in public and sometimes in secret, stand at attention to hear the longest Gospel narrative of the entire liturgical year. This riveting episode needs no interpretation. Young and old, male and female, educated and uneducated, sophisticated and simple—all of us are caught up in the story and understand it. Why is it so universally accessible? The answer must be because it is a truly human drama, with the kinds of characters, action, plots and subplots, emotions, twists and turns that all of us know. Who among us has not experienced something of betrayal, fear, humiliation, misrepresentation, powerlessness, malice from others, remorse, and dark foreboding? This Passion story is not one told in philosophical, theological, or metaphorical language. No, this story is our story, full of the truths of life that no one ever has to teach us.

VATICAN CITY — After months of anticipation, the date of Mother Teresa’s canonization has finally been announced. It falls on Sept. 4, which this year will also mark a special jubilee for workers and volunteers of mercy.Though it’s been rumored for months that Mother Teresa’s canonization will take place Sept. 4, the Vatican made the date official during a March 15 consistory of cardinals.

When we get this close to Holy Week, many Catholics are looking back over their efforts since Ash Wednesday and grading them “E” for “echhh.”Maybe your Lent hasn’t been very meaningful because you’ve just been slacking off, because Lent is hard. Maybe you just don’t feel like reining in even your little bad habits. Or maybe you could probably manage to change some physical habit, but the idea of facing God sincerely is just a little too much, and you’d just . . . rather not. You’re not proud of it, but your plan is to keep your head down so as not to attract attention, and soon it will be Easter and you can eat candy and feel guilty, and then you’ll be safely back in ordinary time before you know it.Not cool, Catholics. Not cool.

Witnessed by Millions: The Confounding Apparition of Our Lady of Zeitoun

Israel had just prevailed in the Six-Day War the previous year. Egypt lost the Sinai Peninsula to Israel. On both sides, passions were high and people were scared. The whole Middle East was in turmoil.And it was in the midst of this chaos that Our Lady appeared.It was the evening of April 2, 1968. A Muslim bus mechanic named Farouk Mohammed Atwa was working across the street from St. Mary Coptic Church in Zeitoun, a district of Cairo, Egypt. The church is revered as one of the locations Christians believe the Holy Family stayed during their flight to Egypt.

In a recent column, I discussed the definition of truth as “what is.” Truth is the equation of thought and thing. It is the conformity of a person’s mind and reality.But where is truth to be found?Catholic philosopher Peter Kreeft sums up the greatest Catholic thinker, Thomas Aquinas, on this question. According to Kreeft, Thomas says truth is found in three places.

There are three institutions in American life that most effectively bring people together to forge strong and lifelong friendships, bridging differences of race, ethnicity, education, and wealth. All three are despised by the secular liberals.What are they not? They are not institutions that isolate people by affirming identities according to vague or arbitrary categories. Colleges across the country have “centers” so defined, and we may end up with something similar at Providence College, if several pawn-pushing professors have their way. This is a mistake, as well intended as it might be, if the aim is friendship rather than political power....more

Are We, As Church, A Receptive Bride?

“I have a desire for something more in my life” I often hear. It is an echo of the deepest ache within, that insatiable hunger for Love Divine. But few realize where the banquet table lies that will satisfy. Few realize our calling as the Church to be a bride, the “Bride of Christ.” Very few know what this really means, and thus the ache, the hunger remains, because we haven’t found the key to let the torrent of God’s spousal love into our hearts.I did not know what it meant as Church to be the “Bride of Christ,” and I acted like a bystander instead of a bride: I prayed in a detached way; I went up to receive Holy Communion with head knowledge about what was taking place, but not of heart. The hunger and longing remained. I sought fulfillment in finite things: popularity, human approval and praise, success in one thing or another, adventure, fun and so on. But the fulfillment was fleeting, very superficial and shallow. It didn’t even begin to touch upon the ache deep within.

Within a few days of the martyrdom of St. Polycarp in the mid-second century, the members of his community sent a report to other Churches with a full eyewitness account. In the course of it, they not only described what they saw, but also revealed quite a bit to future generations about the common assumptions they shared with other Christians of the time, and the common misunderstandings their non-Christian neighbors, both Jew and Pagan, had about them. …more

Oldest Living Man, Auschwitz Survivor Has Some Words of Wisdom for You

Hey, when the world’s oldest man, who is a survivor of Auschwitz, has something to say, it’s time to look up from your Kindle, put down the phone, shake off your earbuds and listen for a moment.Born in Poland, near the town of Zarnow on 15 September, 1903 to parents Moszek-Dawid and Brucha Krystztal, Mr Kristal has lived through both World Wars and survived Nazi war camp Auschwitz in the 1940s before relocating to Israel. Kristal claims the title at the age of 112 years and 178 days as of 11 March 2016, and was awarded his certificate at his home in Haifa, by Guinness World Records’ Head of Records Marco Frigatti.

Lent is a time of intensified prayer. See what Saint John Chrysostom has to say about this discourse with God.“Prayer and converse with God is a supreme good: it is a partnership and union with God. As the eyes of the body are enlightened when they see light, so our spirit, when it is intent on God, is illumined by his infinite light. I do not mean the prayer of outward observance but prayer from the heart, not confined to fixed times or periods but continuous throughout the day and night.

…more

How the Commandant of Auschwitz Found God’s Mercy

Those who survived Auschwitz called the man in charge an “animal.” Rudolf Höss presided over the extermination of some 2.5 million prisoners in the three years he was commandant of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp. Another half a million died there from disease and starvation. A year after his tenure came to an end, he returned to oversee the execution of 400,000 Hungarian Jews. And yet even an “animal” such as he was not beyond the reach of God’s mercy.

In a very short time two of the beautiful couples at our church who celebrated their marriage anniversaries this past year became a widow and the other a widower. Last night our children’s great-grandfather passed away and left his wife of many years a widow. It is easy to understand why Christ mentions widows so much in the Gospels. In fact, Christ has always revealed a very tender side of his Sacred and Merciful Heart in his commitment to those who find themselves alone and vulnerable. How important this message is for our families today in a world that often overlooks the true needs of those who are lonely, terminally-ill, or disabled!

When You Suffer: Biblical Keys for Hope and Understanding by Jeff CavinsWhen You Suffer is a refreshing look at the mystery of pain and suffering and how to find meaning and even joy in the midst of it. Jeff Cavins discusses why we suffer and how our suffering can draw us closer to God. He explains that suffering is the greatest opportunity to love as Christ loves and how, by “offering up” our suffering, we join in Christ’s mission to redeem the world. Lent does seem like the perfect time to read this book, especially as we draw closer to Holy Week. Reading a book about suffering, though, isn’t normally my cup of tea. But all it took was the first chapter for me to change my mind.

A person with whom I was corresponding recently asserted that skeptics are free to hold that objective morality is derived from the society in which we live. In this view, he claimed, moral principles exist beyond the individual and thus are objective.This correspondent is in good company with Richard Dawkins. To the question “How do we decide what is right and what is wrong?”, Professor Dawkins answers, “There is a consensus about what we do as a matter of fact consider right and wrong: a consensus that prevails surprisingly widely” (The God Delusion, 298).

What Every Catholic Should Know About Soon-to-be-Saint Élisabeth of the Trinity

Last Friday, March 4, Pope Francis issued a decree approving the healing of Miss Marie-Paul Stevens as a miracle. Both local officials and Pope Francis recognized that a religion teacher afflicted with Sjögren’s Syndrome while on a pilgrimage to Blessed Élisabeth’s convent in Flavignerot, just outside of Dijon, was healed in 2002. Over the summer of 2011, the Archdiocese of Dijon opened the process for the canonization of Blessed Élisabeth of the Trinity, the Carmelite Mystic of Dijon, France (1880-1906). A formal announcement of her canonization date is expected in the next few weeks.…more

“Risen” and the Reality of the Resurrection

When I saw the coming attractions for the new film Risen—which deals with a Roman tribune searching for the body of Jesus after reports of the resurrection—I thought that it would leave the audience in suspense, intrigued but unsure whether these reports were justified or not. I was surprised and delighted to discover that the movie is, in fact, robustly Christian and substantially faithful to the Biblical account of what transpired after the death of Jesus.

There’s no single path into the Church, that’s clear. We all come with our individual appetites and baggage, hang-ups and history, and yet somehow the Holy Spirit manages to jumble all of it into our individualized itineraries leading home.That includes elements you’d think would work counter to Catholic conversion – like the atheism of Richard Smythe in Graham Greene’s novel, The End of the Affair. Smythe is a foil for the spiritual longings of Sarah Miles, who is desperate not to believe in God. Amid wartime romantic triangulations, Sarah struggles against belief, and Smythe does his best to bolster her inclinations. In the end, however, the atheist’s arguments are simply inadequate, and Sarah abandons herself to the ravenous charms of Holy Mother Church...more

Missing Mass for No Reason

Q: I was visiting relatives over Easter, and sadly they do not attend Mass. I went to Mass, and reminded them that missing Mass was a mortal sin. They said, “Oh, that was in the old days. Missing Mass is no longer a mortal sin.” What do you say? Please give me some ammunition.

Homily from Father CusickSolemnity of the Epiphany Posted for January 3, 2016

Isaiah 60, 1-6; Psalm 72; Ephesians 3, 2-3.5-6; Matthew 2, 1-12

Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

MERRY CHRISTMASTIDE. By longstanding sacred tradition Christians celebrate Christmas as a season, with the twelve days between Christmas and the Epiphany as one long “Christmas day.” The season ends with the Baptism of the Lord. Christmas celebrations with friends and family, decorations, and all of the other means of rejoicing, should continue throughout the season. We can never rejoice in the Lord’s birth too much. As Christians, we will very often find ourselves living in contradiction to the styles and preferences of the present age. We should get very much used to the fact that we will face conflict among friends, and even at times within families, as we seek, more generously and more regularly, to live out and celebrate the mysteries of our redemption in Christ Jesus.

Jesus is conceived by the Holy Spirit in the Virgin Mary’s womb because he is the New Adam, who inaugurates the new creation: ‘The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven.’ (1 Cor 15:45, 47) From his conception, Christ’s humanity is filled with the Holy Spirit, for God ‘gives him the Spirit without measure.’ (Jn 3:34) From ‘his fullness’ as the head of redeemed humanity ‘we have all received, grace upon grace.’ (Jn 1:16) (CCC 504)

“Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.”(Is 60:1) Isaiah the prophet describes the glory of Jesus Christ, who is “full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father”(Jn 1:14), our Messiah. The prophet also foretells the reality of those first three wise men, who represent the kings and the peoples of the whole earth, all of whom are called to realize their full dignity as sons and daughters of God in worship and praise of him for his glory and goodness. “Above you the Lord now rises and above you his glory appears. The nations come to your light and kings to your dawning brightness.” (Is 60:2-3)

The Father’s only Son, conceived as man in the womb of the Virgin Mary, is ‘Christ,’ that is to say, anointed by the Holy Spirit, from the beginning of his human existence, though the manifestation of this fact takes place only progressively: to the shepherds, to the magi, to John the Baptist, to the disciples. Thus the whole life of Jesus Christ will make manifest ‘how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power.’ (Acts 10:38) (CCC 486)

You and I, and all of mankind must, like the shepherds, the magi, St. John and the disciples, come before the Lord in his humble birth at Christmas, and worship him with all of our hearts, minds, souls and strength.

You and I will be seen as acceptable and pleasing to God to the extent that, in Christ, we grow in our praise and worship of him, generously, with our whole being. How do we praise and worship God? Christ is our model and our means. Christ has set down through example and precept the ways in which we live the Christian life.

The ancient “way” of Christian life is repentance and belief in the Gospel, practically and profoundly realized in the sacramental life. The sacraments are the “Epiphany” or manifestation of the Lord for every human being. In the sacraments the whole “glory” of Christ “shines out” so that all nations may fall down in praise before the Lord. Christians, from the first foundation of the Church, have met and known Christ through the words of forgiveness in Confession: “Go, your sins are forgiven you.” And from the beginning, as we do today, Christians have met Christ in the gift of His body and blood in the Eucharist, and have fallen down in worship of Him, our God. “This is my body…this is my blood.” This is the greatest of all the sacraments, the Most Blessed Sacrament.

Let us be ever more generous in our expressions of reverential worship of the Lord. Do we approach Christ at communion with all the reverence, love and worship due to God? Do we observe appropriate silence in Church so that a spirit of prayer may be fostered? Are we distracted, or a source of distraction for others, during Mass? Do we observe the proper postures and practices of the liturgy? Do we chew gum in Church? Do we observe the hour-long fast prior to receiving Communion?

We prepare for the joy of heaven, where will live as the praise of God’s glory forever and ever, by the way we approach the Lord as he manifests himself in the “Epiphany” which is every Mass.

Today we celebrate the Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord. It is not the conclusion of the Christmas Season, that comes next Sunday, but it is one of the most beautiful of the celebrations of the Christmas Season. The word Epiphany means a manifestation of the Lord. The Church sees three initial manifestations of his presence to the world: the visit of the magi, the Baptism of the Lord, and the Wedding Feast of Cana. Our Greek Orthodox neighbors consider all three manifestations in their one celebration of January 6th. In the Roman Catholic Church we divide these over the next week or so.

Of all the celebrations of the Christmas season, the Epiphany with its visit of the three wise men has captured the imagination of many creative writers and deep thinkers. I enjoy telling Henry Van Dyke’s story of The Fourth Wise Man, O Henry’s story of The Gift of the Magi, and G. K. Chesterton’s story of the modern wise men. I had it in my mind for the last week or so that I wanted to focus on the gifts the wise men brought. This led me to finding an Epiphany story I had not heard before. I decided to rewrite it and share it with you today.

The Epiphany gospel is a continuation of the Christmas story in Matthew’s prologue to his gospel (chapters 1-2). The prologue is a theological masterpiece in narrative form through which Matthew anticipates the major historical events he will present in his gospel to explain the significance of Jesus for us.

The names of Jesus are revealed: Messiah, King, Son of David, Son of Abraham, Emmanuel (God with us). As Son of Abraham, Jesus fulfills the divine promise that in Abraham’s seed “all the nations of the earth will find blessing” (Gn 22:18). The miracle of the virginal conception heralds the beginning of the climactic end-time of sacred history. The gentile nations as foretold by the prophet Isaiah come to the New Zion with their treasures to praise the Lord. Jesus will be rejected by many, will suffer persecution and death, but will ultimately triumph through the Father’s providential care in the resurrection.

In today’s Gospel, magi “from the east” ask, “Where is the newborn king of the Jews?” Just by asking this question, they herald the New Light that has dawned on all men.

Gospel (Read Mt 2:1-12)

Today, St. Matthew tells us that after Jesus’ birth, an event loaded with significance for the whole world took place. “Magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem,” looking for a king who had been recently born, the “king of the Jews.” Who were these men, and why did they ask this question?

Instead of choosing the learned, perfect and proud figures of our time to bring about the greatest good; God chooses the small, imperfect and weak souls. It is in the weakness of these souls that God is able to work the most beautiful of miracles. This is the reason why He chose people like Saint Thérèse of Lisieux and (Saint) Teresa of Calcutta to be His instruments of love in the world and why God came into the world as a baby.

Words Fail – Another Meditation on Silence Before the Mysteries of this Christmas Week

Though I wrote last week of holy silence, something urges me (a man of many words) to write of it again. During Mass today, the words of Zechariah came to my mind:

Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion, for behold, I come and I will dwell in your midst, declares the Lord … Be silent, all flesh, before the Lord, for he has roused himself from his holy dwelling (Zechariah 2:11, 13).

There is a common idiom: “Words fail me.” It is in this context that we can best understand God’s call to fall silent before the mystery of the Lord’s incarnation. Notice in the passage above that the call to silence follows the call to “sing and rejoice.”

Mary sees in the face of her child the tears of God and the joy of humanity. Hungrily having clung with unquenchable thirst to her breast in our cold darkness, in every challenge she sees Him ready to teach us how to cling to Him in faith. He at once envelops us in the abyss of his love when we see how He allowed her to wrap Him in swaddling clothes. At home with the poor and all those for whom there is no room in society, she ponders how He leads us to our true home in the bosom of the Trinity. She has always welcomed these unfamiliar gifts with awe, adoration, and selfless acts of mercy. Her example lights the way for us to discover how to rejoice in these troubled times.

The Mercy of God is a mystery. Even for someone like me who has had it poured into my life for the last five years. I keep trying to figure out how exactly to explain it, but the truth is that I can’t. I lived a life that was so enslaved to sin and yet, here I sit as a Catholic who has a personal and loving relationship with God, the Creator of the Universe. How does anyone even begin to explain that? How can anyone explain the Mercy of God? How we walk into a confessional and admit our faults with contrition and resolve to sin no more with the HELP of God Himself. It is crazy and illogical because God loves us irrationally.

“Merciful like the Father” is the motto of the Year of Mercy. What a great reminder for our fatherless culture! What a great challenge and reminder for men on how to live as spiritual fathers.

Fatherlessness is a worldwide pandemic (43% in the US), devastating the culture, family, children, and men in particular, making it harder to experience God as love or to even hear about God. With the sustained Marxist and feminist attacks on the family, marriage, and gender, it does not look as if things will improve anytime soon. But the world’s greatest need right now is to experience the Father’s mercy to undo the effects of fatherlessness.

Sometime around, oh, 3300 years ago, Moses leaned out from Mt. Nebo in Jordan – as I just did a few days ago – and looked over into the Promised Land. Paul VI, St. John Paul II, and Benedict XVI made a point of going there as well. Because from that commanding height, the panorama of subsequent religious history, a history we still remember as no other, is spread out: from the Dead Sea in the South to the Sea of Galilee in the North, with Jericho in the center (a city in Moses’ day already 8000 years old), and just beyond, Jerusalem.

Poor Moses. He faced down Pharaoh, kept the stiff-necked Israelites together (more or less) for forty years in the desert, and even came down from Mt. Sinai with the Ten Commandments. But was forbidden to go any farther. He died and was buried, somewhere unknown, on Mt. Nebo.

Dear Father John, I read recently that the late Cardinal George, God rest his soul, said that heaven is not a place. I’ve also heard this mentioned elsewhere. I have a good understanding of what Jesus said about the kingdom of heaven being within you, among you, etc. But, it seems to me that saying heaven is not a place denies the bodily Ascension of Christ into heaven (and the bodily Assumption of the Blessed Mother for that matter). We say in the Creed “He ascended into Heaven.” So, what is heaven? Is it a state of being, a place, or both? I think it is both, by the way, but I would like to hear the “official” Church position. Thank you and God bless you!

If someone in Capharnaum or Jerusalem at the time had asked the Lord: Who are you? Who are your parents? To what house do you belong? – He might have answered in the words of St. John’s gospel: “Amen, amen, I say to you, before Abraham came to be, I am.” (8:58) Or he might have pointed out that he was “of the house and family of David.” (Luke 2:4)

The timing was right. Last year he was too young but this year it was just right. He had tried out this particular bike at the store but never asked to take it home. He said he knew Santa would get it if it was for him. That was that and we left the store.

Later that day the bike was purchased. It was so easy to dig deep and squeeze that bike into the Christmas budget. On Christmas Eve the shiny red bike stood next to the Christmas tree adorned with a big bow and a note from Santa about having Daddy get him just the right helmet. The pure joy in giving the gift of that first big kid bike to a child… Not many things in life touch this feeling of excitement in a parent’s heart. The heart that anticipates how much the gift will be enjoyed by that particular child as he goes round and round the driveway with a sunny smile on his face.

This is the third installment in our series on the Mysteries of the Most Holy Rosary. Today we look at the Sorrowful Mysteries, those Mysteries which help us to meditate upon the suffering that Jesus underwent for our salvation.

ST. JOHN, the youngest of the apostles in age, was called to follow Christ on the banks of the Jordan during the first days of Our Lord’s ministry. He was one of the privileged few present at the Transfiguration and the Agony in the garden. At the Last Supper his head rested on the bosom of Jesus, and in the hours of the Passion, when others fled or denied their Master, St. John kept his place by the side of Jesus, and at the last stood by the cross with Mary.

Dear Father John, I am trying to be a better person but I need a little help. I know virtues are important, but I don’t know how to get better at them. How can I become more virtuous?

How Much Should I Pray?

In our post-modern, secularized culture, growth in prayer requires commitment and discipline—remember, we are to love God with all our mind andstrength, not only when we happen to feel like it. The basic staples that Christians should include in their spiritual diet include daily, weekly, and seasonal commitments. These will change, vary, and develop as our relationship with God deepens, but here is a sensible starting guideline.

Anthony Doerr’s All the Light We Cannot See, which won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize and has spent over 80 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list, is one of the most beautiful and finely-crafted novels I have ever read. His language is spell-binding, even incantatory, and the intertwined narratives that he composes are deeply involving. Doerr delicately weaves together the stories of Marie-Laure LeBlanc, a blind French girl, and Werner Pfennig an albino German boy, which unfold during the awful years of the Second World War.

On December 8, the fiftieth anniversary of the end of the second Vatican Council as well as the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, Pope Francis inaugurated a special Year of Mercy.

There are many ways in which we can celebrate this holy moment in the history of the Church. In particular, we can undertake more fervent practice of the spiritual and corporal works of mercy. In our time, much attention is paid to the corporal works of mercy, such as feeding the hungry and visiting the sick and imprisoned. These hold a special place in the Holy Father’s heart, and it is always a good idea to extend your practice of these works.

But the spiritual works of mercy are relatively neglected these days, even though they also offer very fruitful ground for celebrating this Year of Mercy. These are: to admonish the sinner; to instruct the ignorant; to counsel the doubtful; to comfort the sorrowful; to bear wrongs patiently; to forgive all injuries; and to pray for the living and the dead.…more

Does what you’re putting in that box honor the people it will go to? Is it your junk, or is it a sacrificial gift?

She challenges us to ask ourselves if we are giving sacrificially, to help the poor, or are we giving just to get rid of stuff, to help ourselves; and to ask ourselves if we’re giving away stuff that will make the poor happy, or if we’re giving stuff that seems good enough for them, because they are poor, and we are not.

The House district that I represented for 18 years is more than a bit incomprehensible to outsiders. And by outsiders, I mean anyone and everyone who didn’t spawn in the pond that both I and the people I represented are from.

I remember trying to explain to another legislator why my constituents reacted to issues as they did. His constituents were constantly in a kerfuffle over whatever hot-button issue du jour was rocking the world at the time. My constituents were steady on about these things. They just trusted my judgment and let me have at it in those areas.

But there were things that they would not abide. Fortunately for me, my constituents and I were one in all this. We thought and, more importantly, felt, alike because we were woven of the same threads.

My colleague didn’t “get” this. It was opaque to him and I wasn’t sure how to explain it so that he could understand.

In one of my favorite Flannery O’Connor stories, Revelation, Mrs. Turpin—a very large, very cheerful, and heartily judgmental soul—amuses herself by mentally sorting people into their respective categories. She places all the people she looks down upon beneath herself and her husband, and only those who have more of what she and her husband have go on the top of the list. When I was a kid listening to my Dad read Flannery O’Connor out loud, Revelation merely made me laugh. Now I read it and wonder “Oh Lord. Have I become Mrs. Turpin?”

Homily from Father Alex McAllister SDSFeast of the Holy FamilyPosted for December 27, 2015

Today in our Gospel reading we hear a lovely story from the hidden life of Jesus as a boy. It is about his visit to Jerusalem when he was twelve years old, how he got lost on the return journey and how his parents eventually found him discussing the scriptures with the doctors in the Temple.

This is an example of the kind of literature we call ‘seeing the man in the boy’. Through this story about the boy Jesus we get an insight into the kind of man he was eventually going to turn out to be. We observe from his discussions in the Temple at such a young age that Jesus is destined to become a great teacher of his people and an expert in the Hebrew Scriptures.

It is a very human story and one that we can all easily identify with. It is even a bit embarrassing for Mary and Joseph who failed to notice that Jesus was missing from the caravan. We can understand their deep anxiety at not finding him for three days. This is something that every parent dreads, hearing as we do from time to time on the news about missing children and their sometimes extremely gruesome fate.

I suppose that in those days Palestine was a more trusting place than the huge cities of today. Nowadays we have to be constantly on our guard against disturbed and dangerous persons and we need strong locks on our doors and even at great inconvenience we drive our children everywhere to avoid them walking on their own in the streets.

But in those days Palestine had a relatively small population living mostly in rural areas and it was probably much safer. The population of Jerusalem, its largest city, is estimated by some at only about 40,000 people which would make it the size of a reasonable sized town in Britain today, Inverness for example.

Nevertheless, Mary and Joseph would have been desperately worried. Besides their natural concern for the son they deeply loved you have also to take into account their awareness of the fact that God had entrusted this child to them born to be the Savior of the World. That’s a pretty awesome responsibility and whether they said anything about it or not they must have been deeply anxious.

The boy Jesus is, of course, quite unconcerned. He is in the most natural place of all, in the Temple of Jerusalem. As the Son of God he would surely regard the Temple as his true home on earth.

And what is he doing? He is discussing the scriptures with the Doctors of the Law and, at his young age, showing remarkable insight and wisdom; so much so that he astounded them all with his intelligence and perception.

Prodigy or not, his parents scold him for the anxiety he caused them. Of course, the precocious child tells them that they should have known he was about his father’s business. But he submits to their authority and meekly returns home to live his life with them in Nazareth where he was to grow into maturity as an adult.

So although our tendency is to think of the Holy Family as some sort of idealized family unit we must realize that its members faced the same pressures as we do. They went through the same crises and had the same worries as we ourselves. This story of a lost child helps us to realize that their family was not so different from our own family.

As we celebrate this beautiful feast we must ask ourselves about our own family groupings. We must ask ourselves if we as individuals are pulling our weight in the family or whether we are expecting others to take up the slack.

Sometimes we are not very good at showing affection to each other. Frequently we let our tempers get out of hand. Often enough we find ourselves giving in to selfishness and failing to treat the members of our own families with the respect that we should.

It is good that this Feast of the Holy Family comes right after Christmas which is, after all, the most family oriented feast of all. We give presents and gifts at Christmas but perhaps it is only on this Feast of the Holy Family that we come to realize that there are many other things that we fail to give to our loved ones.

So often in the family we want the other members to understand our moods and give us a bit of slack from time to time. Yet we fail to do this very thing ourselves. We frequently neglect to appreciate the mood swings that others experience, we often take them for granted and don’t make any allowances for their feelings and difficulties.

Maybe what we all need is to show a bit more patience, a bit more forgiveness, a bit more understanding. If we do these things then our homes will become warmer and friendlier and more nourishing for us all.

The Church throughout its history has constantly proclaimed the value of the family as the basic unit of our society. It promotes, perhaps today more than ever, the need for united traditional families. In these days of family splits and breakdowns it remains ever more vital to uphold the values of family life.

However, we should not take its defense of the traditional family to think that the Church looks down on people belonging to families which have split up and reconfigured in unorthodox ways. This would be an error because the Church values each human person and defends all families whatever their circumstances or however they are formed.

The basic family bond is a bond of love and the Church promotes love above everything else. The Holy Family themselves could hardly be described as fitting the mold of a traditional family. So those whose families which don’t meet traditional expectations should not worry overmuch.

The Church speaks up for the family and it is right that it does so. It proclaims the traditional values of love and honor and respect around which our families can build their lives. The Church believes that a strong upbringing in a good family is the best thing that can provide a sound basis for a solid and honorable adulthood. So let us hope and pray that our society does what it can to uphold the values that will enable families to truly flourish in the modern world.http://www.catholicwealdstone.org/wordpress/?p=2355

The Church places the Feast of the Holy Family on the Sunday after Christmas to help us focus in on Jesus’ early life. Mary and Joseph had the authority of parents over him and he listened to them, though, as today’s Gospel relates, Jesus’ true father was the Eternal Father in heaven. We read in scripture that Joseph took leadership in the family, even getting them up in the middle of the night to flee to Egypt. We know that Mary cared for her child because he needed her to grow into the man the Eternal Father sent the Word to the earth to become. We know that Mary was present for her Son throughout his life, supporting him even as her Son was dying on the cross. We are certain that this family was indeed holy, separate for the Lord.

At the end of Luke’s Infancy Narrative, we find a story that does not really pertain to his infancy, since he is already twelve years old when he visits the temple with his parents on the occasion of the Passover feast. He is there because he has now reached the age of “maturity” and must therefore join the pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the major feasts.

Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, Year C—December 27, 2015

Today, the Church gives us an episode from Jesus’ early family life to ponder. Why?

Gospel (Read Lk 2:41-52)

After the profusion of Scriptures describing Jesus’ Nativity in this liturgical season of Christmas, we might be tempted to think we now know enough about His birth into a special family. However, today the Church reminds us of something most of us spend little time thinking about: Jesus wasn’t simply born into a human family; He grew up and lived the bulk of His life in that family. As the Catechism tells us, “During the greater part of His life Jesus shared the condition of the vast majority of human beings: a daily life spent without evident greatness, a life of manual labor” (531). What was that life like? Our Gospel reading gives us some clues.

Christmas is such a beautiful time of year. Family, friends, and neighbors are welcomed into our homes with loving arms as we anticipate the birth of Christ. He is the reason for the season, and we need to be sure to celebrate his birth appropriately. Unfortunately, many of us Christians are only concerned with the material side of Christmas. We get caught up in the hustle and bustle of sales and deadlines and so forget why this month is so important.

This month, the editors asked me to write about my favorite Christmas ever. I thought quite a bit about that. I could have gone with the Christmas that I got the toy I wanted (1979), my first Christmas as a husband (1992), or my first Christmas as a father (1993). But I’m going with the Christmas of 1970. I was five days old.

I was a Christmas baby. Even to this day, when my mother sees a picture or a video of me as an infant, she often comments (as though she were reporting the news for the first time) that the nurses at the hospital put a little Santa cap on my head when I was going home.

As we get ready to welcome Jesus at Christmas, we also take the time to celebrate his mother and prepare with her. The Blessed Virgin Mary’s intense and joyful waiting for her child to enter the world is a model for all who desire the fullness of Christ’s presence in their lives.

In an Angelus address, St. John Paul II called Mary the “Virgin of Advent.” And in 2013, Pope Francis said, “Mary sustains our journey toward Christmas, for she teaches us how to live this Advent season in expectation of the Lord.”

Sometime around, oh, 3300 years ago, Moses leaned out from Mt. Nebo in Jordan – as I just did a few days ago – and looked over into the Promised Land. Paul VI, St. John Paul II, and Benedict XVI made a point of going there as well. Because from that commanding height, the panorama of subsequent religious history, a history we still remember as no other, is spread out: from the Dead Sea in the South to the Sea of Galilee in the North, with Jericho in the center (a city in Moses’ day already 8000 years old), and just beyond, Jerusalem.

Poor Moses. He faced down Pharaoh, kept the stiff-necked Israelites together (more or less) for forty years in the desert, and even came down from Mt. Sinai with the Ten Commandments. But was forbidden to go any farther. He died and was buried, somewhere unknown, on Mt. Nebo.

I read a story this week about a doctor who changed his attitude toward abortion some years ago. His name is very familiar to those of us who are residents of Northern Virginia: John Bruchalski, MD. He is the founder of the Tepeyac Family Center. This change of heart wound up changing his entire life—and the lives of countless others.

His story reminded me in many ways of other physicians who made the transition from being an abortionist to being a committed pro-life physician. Names like Bernard Nathanson, MD and Beverly McMillan, MD come to mind.

On April 11, 2015, Pope Francis declared a Jubilee Year of Mercy in Misericordiae vultus. When one thinks of mercy, particularly in the context of our Catholic faith, forgiveness and the Sacrament of Confession come to mind. Something deeper, however, is going on. At its core, this Jubilee Year of Mercy focuses us on restoring our dignity as sons and daughters of God; it is intimately connected with the Gospel of Life and its call for a greater respect and defense of human dignity.

We don’t wait well. Every year people like me complain about the world treating December as if it were Christmas, and look censoriously on the Christians who should know better but still belt out “Silent Night” starting in late November. And we’re right to do so. My wife, though a woman of many virtues, would have the tree decorated and the lights shining on Thanksgiving day, and the heck with the church year, were she not blessed to be married to a calendaric rigorist.

I write suffering my annual mid-Advent fit of grumpiness, having spent time with a friend who said “Merrrrrry Christmas!” to everyone and having found myself several times sitting at my computer singing Christmas carols because I’d heard them in the grocery store. It makes me grumpy, our culture’s disregard of Advent, though I probably should admit that I enjoy feeling righteously grumpy.

Time magazine recently published an article titled, “Why Pope Francis Is Obsessed With Mary.” One of the reasons the magazine gave for describing Pope Francis as having an obsession with Our Lady was the fact that he prays the Rosary three times a day. Time is correct in observing that the Holy Father does have a personal devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, but this is not an obsession; it is better described as a very deep love.

I, like you, love the beautiful Christmas season with all its sentimental appeal. And I wish you all of this in abundance. But as we know, the first Christmas was anything but sentimental and featured great hardships: Urgent travel to Bethlehem in the ninth month of pregnancy, no room at the inn, the subsequent flight to Egypt and the murder of the Holy Innocents. It is almost as though Satan, knowing that God was up to something good,

tried to smoke out, prevent and pursue and destroy this great work of God.

And this is exactly what Scripture attests in a version of the Christmas story seldom told among Christians today. Consider the “other” Christmas story that looks behind the external events and interprets the deeper meaning of them:

In a year that brought abundant joy as well as abundant sorrow, Catholics in the United States and around the world continued to witness the mercy and love of God.

While the past 12 months saw considerable violence — in South Carolina and California, in Paris and throughout the Middle East and Africa — 2015 also was a year of celebration, as the cities of Washington, D.C., New York and Philadelphia welcomed Pope Francis during his first visit to the U.S. This joyous visit culminated in hundreds of thousands of Catholics worshipping together on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia as the Holy Father celebrated the closing Mass of the World Meeting of Families.

This time of year we hear a lot about Mary’s role in our redemption. Between the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, and the general discussion about the coming of Christmas, the story of the Annunciation is repeated quite a few times.

Of course, there’s a lot to chew on when we consider the scene between the angel and the Blessed Mother. It’s important to remember that our Blessed Mother said yes to God’s mission with free will. Love is not forced or coerced. It is only given in freedom. Mary, like Eve, made her choice in complete freedom. For many years, when I was reminded of this, I often thought about “what if” she would have said no. Now I think more about the fact that God asked at all.

Dear Father John, I am trying to be a better person but I need a little help. I know virtues are important, but I don’t know how to get better at them. How can I become more virtuous?

Growth in virtue requires exercising virtue. It sounds so simple. And it is. Human nature is made this way. When we nourish and use the powers of our soul properly, they grow, just like muscles. If a young man wants to improve his tennis game, he needs to keep playing tennis; he needs to exercise his skills and abilities so they develop. Just thinking and dreaming about it will get him nowhere. Likewise, if we want to mature in our love for God, if we want to grow in the virtues that unite our heart, mind, emotions, and will to the Lord so we can have deeper communion with him, then we need to nourish and exercise them. And only in that communion will we find lasting happiness.…more

5th Corporal Work of Mercy : “Visit the Sick”

While preparing an article for the next corporal work of mercy (visiting the sick), I immediately thought of one pope who highlighted this practice during his pontificate. That pope was St. John Paul II, who throughout his life emphasized the habit of “visiting the sick.” He is an inspiration to me and challenges us all to renew our own efforts in performing this work of mercy.

And certainly recent headlines — from terrorist attacks perpetrated by radical Islamists in Paris and San Bernardino to the strange brew of warped Christian fundamentalism that appeared to motivate alleged shooter Robert Dear at the Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs — feeds the idea that religion is a force for ill in the world. But in “The End of Faith:

Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason,” Sam Harris not only asserts that the “greatest problem confronting civilization” is religious extremism, he further waxes that it’s also “the larger set of cultural and intellectual accommodations we have made to faith itself.”

One of the most passionately held beliefs among atheists and agnostics is that they can be morally good without belief in God. The underlying assumption is that God is not relevant to morality. But is this true? Can one be good without acknowledging God’s existence?

Homily from Father Phil Bloom Are You Missing Out? Week 2: Mercy with Justice Posted for December 6, 2015

Are You Missing Out? Week 2: Mercy with Justice

Message: Mercy does not cancel out justice.

For Advent homilies I take this question: Are you missing out? Last Sunday we heard Jesus warning: that we might become so distracted we miss the most important events – the salvation God offers us.

This week we begin the Year of Mercy. I do not want you or me to miss God’s mercy. Before talking about mercy, however, I want to address a hesitation: I fear some will conclude that mercy cancels justice: That those who commit crimes and deliberate cruelty will in the end get off scot-free. We all know that in this world there is little justice – that some people “get away with murder.” Will that unfairness continue into the next world? If that’s the case, many people say, I want no part of it. I agree with them.

Let me give three examples. –One, Auschwitz. In preparation for World Youth Day, I have been reading about the Auschwitz Concentration Camp. Can those who carried out those crimes take a place next to their victims – with no reckoning? –Two, domestic cruelty. We see cruelty not only on a huge scale like Auschwitz or the Gulag Archipelago, but in our families: cruel words and acts, some thoughtless, others deliberate. –Three, police brutality. In another country police abused a friend of mine and they laughed about it. Such corruption is not our common experience here, but in other nations and throughout history, it has been the rule. Will God simply sweep those abuses under the carpet? Will bullies have the last laugh? The Bible says “no”! Today John the Baptist speaks about God dealing with crooked ways and rough roads. Next week we will hear John describe a fan that separates wheat from chaff – the good part kept and the worthless part burned.

John does not invent the idea of divine justice. The prophets before him speak about a day of accounting. They know we cannot separate God’s love from his justice. In today’s first reading the prophet Baruch says that God will lead his people “with mercy and justice.” Pope Benedict stressed that mercy does not cancel out justice. “It does not make wrong into right. It is not a sponge which wipes everything away, so that whatever someone has done on earth ends up being of equal value.” (Spes Salvi 44) We sometimes say “people are basically good,” yet we know a terrorist – or a man who murders people at a Planned Parenthood clinic – is hardly the same as a food bank worker.

In the long run we cannot have mercy without justice. Justice, in fact, includes mercy. In Jerusalem, near the remnants of the Temple they have poor box. They did write on it “charity” but “justice.” Justice means to restore right relationships. We need justice before we can talk about mercy.

So where does that leave us? You and I have have acted unfairly. Only a narcissist says, “I’ve never wronged anyone!” No, deep down we all long for mercy – even more than justice. That’s why St. Paul says to leave justice to God – and get busy seeking forgiveness, reconciliation. Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.

A person who reflects on his life will thirst for mercy. We have seen that mercy does not cancel out justice. The two go together, although mercy has greatest importance. The Bible mentions mercy 416 times – and justice 157 times. Between mercy and justice there is word mentioned over 200 times. We will hear it next week. Don’t miss out.

For today, let’s remember that justice includes mercy. God leads us “by the light of his glory, with his mercy and justice for company. Amen.

I think that most of us are in the middle of Christmas preparations. We are trying to get cards out and gifts bought and wrapped. We are preparing for parties, baking cookies, getting ready for the celebration. The celebration is the birth of Christ, the Divine Presence given to us as one of us. We have to remind ourselves continually that it is for this that we are preparing. All the beautiful traditions that are unique to Christmas: the cards, gifts, carols, and shows, are just reflections of the deep celebration we share when we are united to the One who is both one of us and the Second Person of the Divine Trinity.

Luke’s elaborate attempt to locate the arrival of John the Baptist in the context of secular history seems to be the answer to every historian’s prayer. In fact, however, these references are very imprecise, and none more so than the apparently decisive “fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar.” The problem is that the Roman emperor Tiberius shared power with Augustus for two years and we do not know when Luke is beginning his count of the years of Tiberius’ reign. One must wonder whether Luke is not perhaps smiling to himself as he teases historians in this way.

Our readings today sum up in one word what people like us, who are waiting for the Lord’s arrival, should do while we wait: Prepare!

Gospel (Read Lk 3:1-6)

St. Luke carefully sets the historical stage for the momentous event he wants to describe. See how concrete both the civil and religious details are in this description. Promises God had made to his people through the prophets centuries earlier were beginning to be fulfilled, in real time and space. We immediately recognize that what is about to unfold is no fairy tale. Within history, “the word of God came to John, the son of Zechariah, in the desert.” When Jesus, the Son of God, keeps His promise and returns to this world for which He died, it will also be within history, although it will the last event of our history, bringing time (and thus history) to an end.

[Throughout Advent, Fr. Dwight Longenecker will be examining Angels and their role in the stories of our salvation. – Ed]

Medieval theologians were sometimes mocked for debating how many angels could dance on the head of a pin, and Thomas Aquinas was probably one of the theologians who was the target of the ridicule. St.Thomas is called “the Angelic Doctor” not only because of the sublime spirituality of his philosophy, but also because he devoted a good bit of his study to the subject of angels.

Advent can be overlooked. Perhaps, it is more correct to say that we are often looking in the wrong direction during this season. As the lights and tinsel adorn city streets, the true meaning of the Light that came into the world – one still too bright for many – is all too easily lost amidst these other ‘lights’ that, ultimately, cast only shadows. Forced, even at times desperate, ‘jollity’ of one sort or another, possesses nothing of the ‘glad tidings’ that await us all on Christmas night. One antidote to this is spiritual reading. To that end one would do well to pick up a copy of Bossuet’s Meditations for Advent.

Everybody knows, even those of us who have lived most unadventurously, what it is to plod on for miles, it seems, eagerly straining your eyes toward the lights that, somehow, mean home. How difficult it is, when you are doing that to judge distances! In pitch darkness, it might be a couple of miles to your destination, it might be a few hundred yards. So it was, I think, with the Hebrew prophets, as they looked forward to the redemption of their people. They could not have told you, within a hundred years, within five hundred years, when it was the deliverance would come. They only knew that, some time, the stock of David would burgeon anew; some time, a key would be found to fit the door of their prison house; some time, the light that only shows, now, like a will-o’-the-wisp on the horizon would broaden out, at last into the perfect day.

It took me two days, but I finally got all the leaves raked up in the yard. I used the blower to shoo every one of those darn dead things away from the house and the fence and the hedges and then applied old-fashioned hard labor to rake them into piles that my kids, in days long ago, used to love to jump into. I thought about that as I was working; saying my beads on the tips of my gloved fingers as I bent down for yet another scoop and stuffed the leaves into the recyclable bag, knowing I would call my chiropractor next week to alleviate the inevitable ache in my back that would certainly come despite how much I stretched to loosen my muscles that very morning. Old back muscles sometimes don’t follow proscribed protocols no matter what anybody says.

Before he died, he saw his dead sister, our Aunt Tid, and his mother. That’s not uncommon when we are nearing the end of this life. We get glimpses of the new life we are about the enter.

My guess is that God sends loved ones to us, to help us make that transition, that they are a welcoming committee of sorts. I believe God sends our angels, alongside our loved ones who have passed ahead of us, to lead us home.

Death is not annihilation. Your body and soul will be separated for a time, but you will not stop existing, not even for a moment. On that day, you will hear someone say, You are mine.

I believe we often have definitive rationales for what we acknowledge as true and for what we do, even though we may have difficulty expressing them.

A few years ago I had the opportunity through a parish program to chauffer a lady to and from Sunday Mass. Despite her frailty, she went to Sunday Mass because she recognized the inseparable link between sacrifice and sacrament.

She lived in an elder care home on my way. At Mass she sat in the first pew to have Communion brought to her and others who were too frail to participate in the Communion procession. After three months or so, when I stopped at the home on a Sunday morning, I was informed that she died during the week. She had gone to Sunday Mass to the end of her life.

A Church of reverence: Unworthy or irreverent reception of the Eucharist is not something that the Church should take lightly

The Christians of first-century Corinth must have been a rowdy lot.

St. Paul, writing to these converts of his, chided them for their less than edifying manner of celebrating the Eucharist and added a stern warning: “Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord” (1 Cor 11:27).

While the word “nice” has a common use that means pleasant or enjoyable in general as in ‘have a nice day,’ ‘a nice person,’ or ‘a nice job,’ the word does not have the praiseworthy meaning that the word kind signifies.

The virtue of kindness expresses charity in small and large ways that include both speech and behavior and manners and morals.

I guess you never know how little faith you have, until it is tested. Faith never grows, unless it is tested. I have found it to be a vicious lifelong cycle. I think I have faith, it gets tested, and I realize how little faith I have after all.

I have been praying for something for what seems to be a long time. A “long time” in human terms is anywhere from fifteen minutes to decades. In actuality, when I have the benefit of hindsight, I can see where God may have been working in the background lining everything up, but I didn’t notice because I was too preoccupied thinking he wasn’t listening or doing anything. “Doing anything” meaning, what I wanted, how I wanted it, and when I wanted it done.

In my work with our parish’s Confirmation students, I try to convey that Jesus Christ is more than a nice guy whose life is recorded in the Bible. Jesus wants us to know Him and to love Him. He wants to be a part of every aspect of our life, if only we would invite and allow Him to do so.

This past weekend we celebrated the feast day of Christ the King. This is one of Jesus’s many roles in salvation history. It’s quite easy for us to state the fact: Jesus Christ is King of the Universe, but how easy is it for us to answer the question of whether or not he is the King of OUR Universe, the King of OUR lives?

The Catholic Church asserts the truth that mankind has suffered a privation of grace as a consequence of disobedience. By the sin of our first parents we are saddled until the end of time with the defect of Original Sin. Man is fallen. To be born into this world is to be burdened with a life of toil, trial and torment. Adam and Eve were in a state of grace in the Garden of Eden before succumbing to temptation. The doctrine of The Fall is a most obvious proposition expounded upon by nearly every religious and philosophical tradition in history. To deny man’s fallen nature is an unprecedented narrowness based on implausible pathology grounded in the denial of the most vital attributes that make us fully human.

“It’s not all about you!” Except, it sort of is. You are there every minute of your day. Everywhere you go, there you are. Who stars in all your dreams? You again.

Yet, detaching from self is mandatory for holiness. It is our life-long task, to get over ourselves by following Jesus whose life, death, and resurrection were all about us. Here are ten ways to help with that task.

In the 60’s the Beatles composed a song and an album: “Sergeant Pepper’s lonely heart-club band.” World-famous for this song and album, the Beatles were placing their finger on the pulse of the modern society, a society with many individuals suffering from a crushing and almost unsupportable loneliness.

There are many ways that individuals cope with loneliness; some are excellent, others are good to a certain extent, others are bad and still others are deadly. A crushing loneliness can grip an individual in such a way that depression sets in and he/she feels life has no real meaning and questions why even live. Some, even, contemplate a recourse to suicide.

We’ve never been keen on Black Friday—however … there is something to be said for getting shopping done this week so you can get the most out of Advent, as Zoe Romanowsky wrote here last week.

Perhaps we could spare a few minutes to Christmas shop—online—for these lovely gifts, handmade by monks and nuns from monasteries and religious communities. These are a few of the Aleteia staffs’ favorites:

The holidays always remind me of how different I am from my husband. He is a doer. He does things. He wakes up every morning and goes through the same routine to get ready, then he figures out his mission for the day and sets out to accomplish that mission. Every. Day.

Me? I am a sloth. I never have a plan for anything, unless that plan will help me get in my pajamas and in bed early, then I have a plan. I do not need anyone to tell me to take a day off or to relax, because I am always looking for a way to crawl back into bed with a book. Relaxing is more than just something that I do, it is a state of being for me.

Bucket lists (i.e., lists of stuff you should oughtta wanna do before you kick the bucket) are hot these days. So, canny fellow that I am, I thought I would put together a bucket list of ten things a Catholic should oughtta wanna do before he or she takes the dirt nap, lays down in the back of that long black Cadillac, and otherwise stops squeezing the plasma pump behind the sternum.

The trouble with this clever idea is that you then have to make a judgment call. Should I give you my personal bucket list about stuff I’d like to do (which might include something like “read all the works of Shakespeare”) leading to your eyes crossing and a warm numb feeling stealing over you? Or consider: Suppose I vowed to learn how to make the perfect omelet and serve it to my wife before I croak. It could even be an act of piety and an honor to God done from the core of my Catholic faith and fulfilling a vow I whispered to my sainted grandfather on his deathbed (after a moving and dramatic story that is too long to tell here).

Catholic priests are heroes to me. After the sacrifice and moral fiber of my own father in this earthly life, the spiritual fathers God has sent into my life have most inspired me to be a better man in my own vocation. I’ve gotten to know diocesan priests, Jesuits, Franciscans, Dominicans, Oblates of Mary Immaculate, Oratorians, Oblates of Wisdom, and Fathers of Mercy who served as pastors, confessors, bishops, administrators, teachers, theologians, tailors, gardeners, preachers, broadcasters, canon lawyers, authors, and friends. In all their variety, they all have had several things in common: all of them have adored Jesus, venerated Mary, who is the mother of priests, and all of them are flawed sinners just like me. These are imperfect but dedicated people, working on personal holiness and growing into their vocations as they lead their flocks. My experience has been nearly always positive, and it makes me cringe when I hear people single out their priests, spread scandal, and detract their reputations.

Homily from Father Alex McAllister SDS Feast of Christ the King Posted for November 22, 2015

Today we conclude the Liturgical Year with our celebration of the feast of Christ the King. On this final Sunday of the year we meditate on Our Lord Jesus Christ and acknowledge that all creatures in heaven and on earth are ultimately subject to him as the Universal King.

For our Gospel text we have the interesting exchange between Jesus and Pontius Pilate about his Kingship; this interaction occurs on the steps in front of Pilate’s palace on the night of his arrest. Of course, Pontius Pilate is very concerned to hear about Jesus’ claims to kingship since he was the representative of Caesar and it was his duty to uphold the authority and might of Caesar in Palestine. And it was his particular role to root out anyone who claimed to rival Caesar.

It immediately becomes clear that they are talking on completely different levels; Pilate seeming to be concerned only with earthly authority while Christ is speaking about his universal spiritual authority. One focussing on the human, the other on the divine.

Surprisingly perhaps, Pontius Pilate does not regard Jesus as any kind of real threat to Caesar. Maybe this was because Jesus does not arrive with soldiers and weapons but simply as himself together with his known abilities as a healer and miracle worker.

Pilate seems to regard the arrest of Jesus as merely the outcome of a religious squabble among the Jews and therefore as something beneath his attention. But he does not want the blood of Jesus on his hands and offers to release him. This shows that Pilate does not understand the Jewish authorities nor the nature of the threat that Jesus presents to them.

We are here dealing with St John’s account of these events but in St Matthew’s Gospel we read how Pilate had been given a warning by his wife to have nothing to do with harming Jesus because she had a disturbing dream about him.

In the text before us Jesus speaks about truth. He says that he came into the world to bear witness to the truth and that all who are on the side of truth listen to his voice. Unfortunately we miss the next line which has Pilate’s reply, “What is truth?”

Clearly Pontius Pilate does not have much time for truth. He is a politician and as such he is used to the venality of man and the tricks and half-truths used by the various factions of the political elite. What he is interested in is authority and governance. He is a ruler and wants nothing to disturb the established order and his position as the effective governor of Palestine.

Christ on the other hand is focussed on the really important things in life, namely the virtues. Material possessions and the exercise of power do not interest him; in fact he knows very well that these things go completely against that which is truly fulfilling in life.

His message to us is that it is only truth, justice, unity, fidelity and similar virtues which bring true happiness and fulfilment in life. He wants us to understand that we are living in a passing world and that our eyes ought to be set on the Kingdom where these values come into their own.

Pursuing the acquisition of wealth and power can never be truly satisfying. Things like celebrity and purely human fame are in the long run completely worthless. Ultimately the things that the world admires are empty and unfulfilling.

What lasts are the eternal values and in the end all these come down to one thing: love. It is the person that loves others with their whole heart who finds the most fulfilment in life. It is those who love God with all their hearts who find real peace in this world and the next.

Pilate says, “What is truth?” For him this is a dismissal of something that he regards as quite unimportant and ultimately worthless. As a politician and as a man of the world living in Roman times he has obviously seen men give their lives for their principles but apparently he felt that in the end they were giving their lives in vain.

To Pilate principles were clearly something expendable. He does not value love of country or family or party very greatly. Pilate lives his life entirely in the present moment and the things that he values are only those things which will bring him advantage or personal gain. He is not a bad man but his values are distorted and he has no eye for eternity. He thinks in the short term.

Pilate’s question though is of vital importance for anyone who believes that God is in charge and for anyone who believes in an afterlife. It is of vital importance because God clearly regards truth as something absolutely critical.

Truth like many other concepts that fall into the religious field is perhaps best defined by looking at its opposite, in this case falsehood. That which is false cannot be trusted, it is tricky and unreliable. And ultimately falsehood is not something on which anyone can base their lives.

Truth, however, is what corresponds with the facts and is a faithful reflection of reality. Truth is therefore utterly reliable and dependable and what is more it corresponds to the nature of God himself.

This is the key. If we are to describe God then we use words like true, good, trustworthy, faithful, one, eternal and so on. Consequently if we want to become like God then we need to adopt these values and make them an essential part of our lives.

We need to become persons who are truthful, good, faithful, just and all those other attributes which we ascribe to God. If we adopt these as our priorities in life we will be filled with integrity and be considered as persons worth looking up to and following. We will be living then a life that is truly worthwhile and fulfilling, a life that is greatly satisfying; a life, in other words, that is in complete conformity with the will of God.

It will be by living such a life that will get us to heaven, for to live any other kind of life will mean that our horizons are based only on the things of this world and not the things of the next world.http://www.catholicwealdstone.org/wordpress/?p=2323

The Solemnity of Christ the King of the Universe: The Testifier to the Truth

A few years ago, I attended the YMCA Mayor’s Prayer Breakfast in Clearwater and was electrified by the speech given by the Keynote Speaker, Retired Lt. General Gary H. Mears. General Mears spoke the need to restore truth to our society. He began by mentioning that a sign was found in the Nazi soldiers’ quarters in Auschwitz that said something to the effect, “All who arrive here are to be deceived.”